Wisconsin Dells

Towards the end of spring break, we took a little trip up to the Wisconsin Dells with Aunt Domi, Uncle Brandon, Hunter and Caroline. We took Ben when he was 2 and he went with Mama Kay and Papa once too, but this was a first for Abbey and Juliette. We went up on Thursday after lunch and got there just in time to check in and spend some time at the water parks before dinner! At first, everyone needed a little help going down the slides...

But before long, they were all pros...

Juju quickly discovered that her favorite place was the "hot pool", so whenever anyone went in they were sure to grab Juliette so she could go too.

Abbey was quite impressive going down the slides - she had no fear and would go down any which way - backwards, on her tummy, on her back, etc.

That night we celebrate Aunt Domi's birthday with the cake we made her.

The kids trying the lemons that were on top...

The next day we hit the wave pool, which the girls loved! It made me nervous, but they seemed to have no fear about it.

Our resort had 4 indoor water parks and each one had a little kids area, which was great. Juliette was a bit nervous of the slides unless we went with her, but she did pretty well just playing in the water.

One of the water parks had duck races in the lazy river every morning. Each kid picked out a duck and put their name on it, then they dumped all the ducks at one end and they pulled the first 3 ducks to reach the designated point to win a prize. Here are Ben and Caroline watching the race...

Go ducks!

They did 3 races. Abbey won in the first race and Juliette won in the third race. The prizes were duck whistles. But everyone was a winner because you got to keep your duck!

Uncle Brandon took Caroline and Juliette in the "hot pool" with their ducks!

One of the parks had a huge bucket that would fill up and dump down a ton of water. Here is Paul protecting Ben from the deluge!

Aunt Domi took Abbey in the lazy river, but I don't think she got to be very lazy in it! Abbey clung on for dear life to Aunt Domi and would not let her relax in a tube. Poor Aunt Domi had to walk around the whole lazy river holding Abbey! It looks like she is enjoying it in this picture, but as soon as the picture was taken her hand went back around Aunt Domi's neck to hold on tightly! I don't know why she has no problems with slides but a lazy river scared her...ah Abbey!

Ben and Daddy did enjoy the lazy river the way you are supposed to though!

Finally Aunt Domi got to relax in a tube...as long as she kept Juliette occupied with her duck!

Juliette did enjoy playing in the fountain tables though.

Abbey being crazy on a slide!

Mommy and Juju in the hot pool...

There were also bumper boats. I don't know...can you tell from this picture what Ben thought about this activity?

More on post #2...

Spring Break!!

Time is flying and all of a sudden we found ourselves on spring break!  Unfortunately, the weather wasn't nearly as nice as it was the week before spring break, so we caught up on a few indoor activities we had been neglecting due to being outside so much this winter with the wonderful weather we had!  So, we started off working on some crafts that the kids had received for Christmas from Santa Claus!  Look at their popsicle art and cupcake art creations! 

And there was quite a few theatrical presentations that the kids prepared for our viewing pleasure.  They were so cute - they would practice and practice and then call us down to watch their show.  Look how excited Ben...I mean Buzz Lightyear...is as he starts off the show!

Love this picture of Ben!  And you can see Abbey...I mean Ariel...in the background getting ready for her part.

Here is Abbey's part!

And of course there was a swinging turtle!

Then there were some costume changes before they moved on to Act 2.  Now Juju is a tiger!

And I think Batman was saving Snow White here (I'm still not entirely sure what these plays were about, but they were fun to watch regardless)!

And when the weather was nice, we got around to preparing the garden!  Paul and the kids worked very hard to get the lawn and yard cleaned up from the winter.  And they went ahead and planted some lettuce in the garden (it can apparently withstand a freeze if we should get another one - we held off on all other plants as we still are not yet convinced there won't be another freeze yet this spring).  Although this year we did start growing some plants from seeds inside.  We have 12 tomato plants under a light right now they have just started to sprout!  But, while playing around back by the compost pile, Belle caught a mouse!  Ben (wearing gloves) wanted to hold the mouse and protect it, so here is Ben (with the mouse), Paul and the girls walking the mouse up to the field around the block to build it a house and let it go.  Paul probably would have gotten rid of it another way, but our animal loving son wanted to make sure the mouse was ok!

There they go to set the mouse free!

Belle was helpful in other ways though.  Here she is resting in the shade.

But then we put her to work...her digging actually came in handy in digging up the compost pile!

Other than preparing the garden, putting on plays, and doing crafts, we also just got to spend time playing together!

Ben and Juju played house together while Abbey colored nearby...

And the kids put on the world's biggest tea party (idea taken from a My Little Pony book we got out from the library).  They made invitations, prepared the tea and lemonade, set the places and gave every plate some Clemintines for snacks.  It was very well thought out (including a list prepared by Ben) and well executed!

Paul and I were both invited (as were a few select teddy bears), but really the kids worked really well together to get it all ready!

Juju was excited about it - look at our tea party!

And there was also baking done during the week.  The kids love to help me cook or bake things and we had an important item to bake this week...a birthday cake for Aunt Domi!  Aunt Domi likes lemon cake, so we found a recipe online and went to work.  I had never made a lemon cake before and I will tell you what I learned...1) it takes quite a few lemons to squeeze out enough juice required for the cake and 2) it takes quite a few lemons to make enough zest required for the cake.  So, we had to go out and buy more lemons than what we initially had!  It was fun though!

Then we had a lemon left, so we decided to use it for decoration on the cake.  Each of the kids participated in coming up with the idea for decorating it.  Ben and I thought of the lemon flower, Ben thought of the sun, Abbey wanted pink around the flower, Juju wanted the green grass, and Ben thought to add the pink flowers to the bottom of the cake.  It turned out pretty cute!  But then I learned another lesson...lemons on the cake make the icing run.  By the time we got the cake to the Dells to give to Aunt Domi, it sort of looked like a mess of a cake.  Luckily, I took a picture right after we decorated it.  Domi, this is what it did look like originally!

We had a great start to the week and then it was time for some real fun with a trip to the Wisconsin Dells with the Acuff family!  More to come on that...

St. Patrick's Day

St. Patrick's Day fell on a Saturday this year and the weather was amazing, so we decided to meet up with our friends, the Weck's, and go to Brookfield Zoo! You can see that Ben is in his full Irish wear (complete with a hat he made in school) and Abbey is wearing as much green as she has in her almost totally pink wardrobe (notice the green on her shirt).

Juju has a green skirt she is wearing and I have my green dress. There was a lot of green at the zoo that day! But here we are looking at the camels (and thinking of Madgie riding one)!

Then we met up with the Wecks and luckily, Ben and Aiden were able to read the maps to tell us where to go next!

Connor and Abbey helped too...

Just a cute pic of Abbey...

Do you recognize these wolves found only at Brookfield Zoo?

Abbey liked posing with pretend animals.

Ben...

Look at this monkey!

Abbey the teacher...

Teaching us all about a healthy diet...

And then about keeping our planet clean...

Here is the parade of kids (Juliette and Gavin both took naps in their respective strollers during the afternoon).

Ben got up close and personal with the leopards.

There's Gavin! They are all checking out the hippo.

We got to see the staff feeding a hungry hungry hippo and it was pretty amazing to watch. Their mouths open so wide - almost 180 degrees! It was just like the game!

It was very neat to see. They weren't particularly good at catching the food though. It would go in and sort of bounce back out before he closed his mouth, but then he would just chomp down and get most of it.

It was a really great day - the kids were all fantastically behaved, especially considering we spent all day there and I am sure they were exhausted by the end, but they held it together surprisingly well. Then we stopped to get some dinner on the way home at Jason's Deli as Paul really wanted a corned beef sandwich. We did make the traditional Corned Beef and Cabbage dinner, but it was a few days later. Oh well, spending all day at the zoo was worth not having enough time to prepare the traditional meal that day! Happy St. Patrick's Day (a few weeks late)!